Did they use any real lions in the film?

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majorbase2

New member
I didn't think that they used any real lions for Aslan, but on IMDB it says that they used a real lion when showing Aslan walk out of his tent.
 
I 'm not sure about that but ...what was really neat about this film wasn't just the awesome computer special effects but the way they also mixed live animal action with the computer stuff ( wolves, for example). It was darn near impossible to figure out at first whether some of those creatures were real or just graphics. Every hair, every whisker...the muscles, everything was just so well done !!
 
majorbase2 said:
I didn't think that they used any real lions for Aslan, but on IMDB it says that they used a real lion when showing Aslan walk out of his tent.
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They did use a lion, but only Three or four times. I don't get how they {the crew} made the wrinkles on the witch's dress when Aslan jumped on her. It was CG!!!! If you could PM me the answer that would be nice...
 
There wasn't a real lion in the film because most of the stuff couldn't be done even with a trained lion. They did use locks of lion hair (in the Creating Creatures section, click on Aslan) and may have also studied real lions. Plus, it would've been dangerous to use real lions.
 
We talked about this in the Official Aslan thread in the cast and crew section a few weeks ago. I heard, or read, and can't remember right off now where, that they did study real lions for the film and the lion that was the prime example was a lion named Zion and that they did use a real lion in the film but only when there was no interaction with humans involved, which would have been very little as far as screen time goes. There have been some interesting posts on this at the aforementioned thread if any of you are interested, feel free to come give it a look.
 
Well, maybe I was wrong. There may have been a real lion when there was no human interaction there. But, from what I've gathered, on the program it said there were no real lions used. I could be wrong.
 
Lions used for Aslan

The most notable lion used as a model for Aslan is a lion named 'Zion', who lives at Zion gardens in (are you surprised??) New Zealand. As has been pointed out, the behaviors required of Aslan in this film would have been difficult if not impossible to do with a real lion. (Although lions are quite trainable, thay are cats!) Aslan is usually CGI, although models were used in some scenes, later to be replaced with CGI.

Another reason why real lions were not used was the look the producers wanted for Aslan. They wanted his face to be somewhat 'anthropromorphic', thus the proportions were altered just a bit. Enough to be noticeable, but not enough to be really describable. (Had I been the producer, I would have not have anthropromorphized his face.)

Safety is also a real concern these days. With lawyers, animal rights wackos and lawmakers just looking for another thing to regulate, it has caused a big decline in the use of real animals for films. It wasn't that many years back when animals were still the best for movies, and we had films like 'Gladiator' and 'The Ghost and the Darkness'. (They tried animatronic lions in the latter film, and they were so bad that they decied to shoot the entire film with real lions. The animatronic lion appers in just one shot. At the time, The Ghost and the Darkness' was considered the most difficult big cat film ever done, and only possible because an unusually trainable lion was available at the time. 'Gladiator' outdid this film a year later, and to my knowledge, has not been topped.)

A couple years ago, I was presented with the skin of a lion I knew who had rather suddenly died (I do research on lions). I had this lion rugged. As I knew the history of this lion, I knew what he looked like when he was alive. In comparing his skin to the models of Aslan prepared by WETA, the two are remarkably similar, down to having bare patches on the shoulders, and similar belly manes. The Aslan in the film has a heavier mane than the WETA model and my rug. This lion is also considerably bigger than a real lion, but not as big as the 'book' Aslan. Here I am with this lion, who was named 'Chucky'. http://www.lionlamb.us/temp/Chucky_Tim_m.jpg (Some of the belly mane was lost in the rugging process.)
 
That is awesome. I love cats big and small....I watch too much Animal Planet and Mutual of Omaha shows I guess...I just saw a special on lions on one of those channels a little over a week ago.


I just really commend the special effects people who worked on Narnia for bringing us such fantastic images and creations. Without them and the technology these films would not be possible.
 
Re:Aslan-real lion or not...

I dun think so, U c, at first I also thought Aslan was some wonderfully-trained lion borrowed from a circus but when i read one of the posts here I actually found out it was CGI, not real...But I'm not veri sure 'bout that! :D
 
Aslan is not real, they did not use a real lion in any of the scenes. They did do some motion capture with Zion the lion though. the times they used an animatronic lion were in the closeups of the girls on his back as they rode to the witches castle, and the lion on the stone table when the girls are crying over him is also an animatronic lion. :)
 
It would have been too dangerous to use a real lion on set..I don't wanna think about what it could have done there..but they looked very much at a special kind of lions while making Aslan.Does anybody know what kind of lions that was? :confused:
Anyway,they did Aslan VERY well he looked very realistic :)
 
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Daughter_of_Eve_92 said:
It would have been too dangerous to use a real lion on set..I don't wanna think about what it could have done there..but they looked very much at a special kind of lions while making Aslan.Does anybody know what kind of lions that was? :confused:
Anyway,they did Aslan VERY well he looked very realastic :)
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You may be referring to the Barbary lion. Barbary lions originally inhabited North Africa and the Middle East. They are very large lions, with very heavy black manes. Barbary lions went extinct in the Middle East during Biblical times, and in North Africa by 1920. However, a large number of Barbary lions have been captured before they were extinct, and have found homes in zoos, circuses, etc.

Scientists are very interested in captive Barbary lions because there are enough reasonably pure examples of them in captivity to recreate the subspecies. A number of reaearchers are working on this around the globe, but have been hampered by lack of funding. A large tract of land has been purchased in the Atlas mountains in Morocco as a place to reintroduce the lions.

Zion is listed as a Barbary lion candidate, and this is acknowledged on Zion Garden's website. (I am calling these 'Barbary candidates' because there is no true test yet to determine whether or not a lion is truly 'Barbary'. Developing this test is one of the parts of this project that keeps losing funding.)

I am involved in the Barbary lion project in that I help care for a Barbary candidate (Kenya, the lion in my avatar), and know the other two Barbary candidates here in Nevada (see thm at www.tigertouch.org ). If this interests you, watch the news. Interest in this project is starting to pick up again.
 
timbalionguy said:
You may be referring to the Barbary lion. Barbary lions originally inhabited North Africa and the Middle East. They are very large lions, with very heavy black manes. Barbary lions went extinct in the Middle East during Biblical times, and in North Africa by 1920. However, a large number of Barbary lions have been captured before they were extinct, and have found homes in zoos, circuses, etc.

Scientists are very interested in captive Barbary lions because there are enough reasonably pure examples of them in captivity to recreate the subspecies. A number of reaearchers are working on this around the globe, but have been hampered by lack of funding. A large tract of land has been purchased in the Atlas mountains in Morocco as a place to reintroduce the lions.

Zion is listed as a Barbary lion candidate, and this is acknowledged on Zion Garden's website. (I am calling these 'Barbary candidates' because there is no true test yet to determine whether or not a lion is truly 'Barbary'. Developing this test is one of the parts of this project that keeps losing funding.)

I am involved in the Barbary lion project in that I help care for a Barbary candidate (Kenya, the lion in my avatar), and know the other two Barbary candidates here in Nevada (see thm at www.tigertouch.org ). If this interests you, watch the news. Interest in this project is starting to pick up again.
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Thank you! Now I know what I want for christmas :D A BARBARY LION
 
QueenAravis48 said:
well they said that Aslan was 98% CGI, you can especulate about the other 2% ;)
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The other 2% was done with a model lion, like in the stone table, when he's draged allong, and when General otoman hits him.
 
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